


safe and sound.

by katarama



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Long-Distance Friendship, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, Sharing Clothes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-23 06:24:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17075060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katarama/pseuds/katarama
Summary: It always strikes Stiles as odd how much werewolves talk about how people smell.Stiles doesn’t know how not to be aware of Scott, and the way he smells, at any given time.





	safe and sound.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hazelNuts](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hazelNuts/gifts).



> Happy Holidays, Marianne! You asked for fluff and clothes sharing - I hope you enjoy!

It always strikes Stiles as odd how much werewolves talk about how people smell.

He knows there is the whole magical werewolf feelings smelling thing.  Chemosignals, or whatever. He knows that more than once, he has watched Malia think through the process of modulating her tone from disgust to concern when she tells him he stinks, because apparently anxiety is rancid outside of his head as well as inside of it.

But most of werewolves’ senses are enhanced, Stiles figures.  They have better eyesight, better ears. It only makes sense that everything kind of adjusts, or they would be walking around constantly overstimulated and headachey.

Maybe they are.  Maybe that explains like a third of why Derek is the way he is.

They always make this production, though, of knowing what someone smells like.  Stiles knows that they can smell it better, can pick up scent when there is less scent to pick up.  Hell, he’s even used it before, asking people in the pack to track down something or someone by smell.

It just seems weird to him that it is treated as unique.  Like no human people are so attuned to someone else’s smell that they stumble across an old bottle of perfume that their mother used to love when they were little and had to try not to burst into tears because of the intense sense memories it brought back.  Like no human people get used to someone’s laundry detergent, or shampoo, or lack thereof.

There was that long period of time when Stiles spent way too much time at the mall trying to figure out exactly which bottle of Macy’s perfume Lydia had switched to, but he is going to just pretend that didn’t happen, because everyone will be all the better for it.

Stiles can't walk around the locker room gym and smell overripe teen and gallons of Axe and not think of Scott when he was 12 and using his allowance to splurge on a bottle for them to share.  It made them both gag, but neither of them was ready to admit to that, and they kept using it for a month and a half.  Stiles has done grocery runs with Scott in which they test smelled laundry detergent together. 

Stiles doesn’t know how not to be aware of Scott, and the way he smells, at any given time.

When Stiles is away at school and nothing in his new dorm room and his new life smells like Scott, it is more than a little bit jarring.

 

* * *

 

There is a flurry of movement and noise when Stiles turns the knob to open the McCall house front door.  He’s used to a certain amount of hectic around the holidays there - it has always been that way, even before the McCall house became home base for an unruly werewolf pack.  He isn’t surprised to immediately have Melissa McCall wrapping her arms around him, though, squeezing him tight and welcoming him home.

“It’s only been a few months,” he says weakly, because he’s missed this, too, the smell of the oil Mama McCall uses in her hair and the warmth of her hugs.

“A few months too many,” she tells him before finally letting go.  She turns to call Scott, but Scott is waiting right there, his hands stuffed into the pockets of his ever-familiar red hoodie.

“Hi,” Stiles says.  It’s been a long few months, being apart.  Longer than Stiles thought it would feel. “I missed you.”

Scott pulls Stiles in for a hug, softer and less emphatic than his mother’s.  Stiles feels it to his core, though, the familiar shape of Scott’s body pressed against his, the warmth and reassurance of his maybe more than best friend hugging him close.

“You didn’t change your aftershave,” Stiles says, “which I guess makes sense, since your Snapchat seems to indicate that you never actually shave anymore.”

Scott laughs, and Stiles can feel the vibrations pressed against him.  “Well, one of us can actually grow in facial hair, so….”

“I missed you,” Stiles says again, softer, so only Scott can hear it.  He feels like he has to keep saying it until Scott says it back, because Stiles is the clingier of the two of them, but Scott is usually the sentimental one who starts off with the hope and change and true friendship and love stuff.  Stiles can't kick off this Christmas break being the only emotionally available one.

“I missed you, too,” Scott says back without missing a beat.  “It’s good to have you home.”

 

* * *

 

When Stiles had left, he and Scott were in limbo.  They had started to have talks, in the last days before their respective moves, about not knowing how to be without the other, and about maybe friendship not entirely being the right word.  They never finished up those talks, though, when Stiles was a short drive away, and when Scott could prevent him from avoiding talking about his feelings in person.

They’ve been there.  The feelings. The intense awareness of Scott has followed him through the years, and he may be a bit thick sometimes, and it may have maybe taken him longer to figure out than it should have, but even he can’t hide from reality forever, regardless of his general ‘ignore it and hope it goes away’ life strategy.

Scott is not so much an ‘ignore it and hope it goes away’ kind of person, especially these days.  

They sit, and they talk.  Stiles protests heavily and tries to change the subject.  Scott indulges him, but gently guides the conversation back.

Stiles admits that there is more than one kind of way to love someone, and that he maybe has at least a couple of them covered with Scott.

Scott asks Stiles to be his boyfriend, and Stiles says yes.

In a lot of ways, after years of being _ScottandStiles_ , this should be the climax, the big build-up.  In reality, to Stiles it just feels like things finally slotting into place just right. Like a breath out after months of keeping it held inside, his lungs screaming but his mouth held firm.

At the end of the day, Scott makes it easy on him, because that is just who Scott is.

 

* * *

 

“I have a present for you,” Scott says on the last day before Stiles heads back to school, a week before Scott heads back himself.

“We already did presents.”

“We did family presents,” Scott corrects.  “And pack presents. This is different.”

Before Stiles can protest that he definitely did not know about this rule and did not get Scott any secret special just them gift, Scott hands him a box, wrapped messily in heavily taped, combined ends of rolls of wrapping paper.  

It takes Stiles longer to get through the tape and wrapping paper than it should, but when he finally gets the box open, he finally understands.

Laying on top of bright green tissue paper is Scott’s red hoodie, the one with the sleeves frayed at the ends and the strings gnawed.  Stiles holds it up to his face and smells Scott’s shampoo in the hood and his aftershave around the collar and his sweat in the armpits.

“Dude, you didn’t wash this,” Stiles says, surprised.  

“I didn’t,” Scott agrees.  “That was kinda the point.”

It takes Stiles two seconds before he is sliding the hoodie on over his head, ignoring the fact that the sleeves are way too short, and closing his eyes.

“It smells like you,” Stiles says, and he can feel Scott’s smile without seeing it.

“Maybe now you won’t forget me, off in the big city,” Scott says.

Stiles laughs, because that is the only real response he can offer.

He loves Scott McCall like he loves home, and he couldn’t forget him if he tried.


End file.
